Richard Butler qualified MRCS LRCP from Cambridge and St Thomas's Hospital in 1927 and he spent his early postgraduate years gaining experience in general and orthopaedic surgery, working for Bristow, Perkins and Trethowan. He became FRCS in 1928 and took the MCh in 1933, winning the Robert Jones Go

Harold Jackson Burrows was born at Harrow, Middlesex, on 9 May 1902. His father was Harold Burrows FRCS and his grandfather was a graduate of St Bartholomew's Hospital, who became a Surgeon-Major in the Bombay Army. He was educated at Edinburgh House, Lee-on-Solent and Cheltenham College, where he w